In subways, parking lots, freeways and other places where traffic is heavy, generally, cards such as IC cards are dispensed to facilitate flowing of the traffic. As a large number of cards are to be processed everyday, an automatic card dispensing device is developed to save manpower resources and improve trading efficiency. The automatic card dispensing device should have a high reliability, otherwise, a serious congestion may occur once the automatic card dispensing device malfunctions.
In the automatic card dispensing device, one of the key components is a card separating mechanism installed on a card storing box. The card separating mechanism is mainly composed of the following two parts: a card picking mechanism which pushes a card forward by a static frictional force generated when the card picking mechanism is in contact with the card surface; and a card dispensing mechanism in which a card passage is formed by a guide plate and an adjustment plate to allow the card pushed by the card picking mechanism to smoothly pass through till the card is completely sent out. In operation, the card separating mechanism cycles the above process till all the cards are sent out. The conventional card separating mechanisms mainly adopt two operation manners. One is mechanical separation by which a card is pushed by reciprocating motion of a scraper and is separated from the card storing box by taking a tail end of the card as a point where a force is applied. However, in this manner, the surface of the card may be abraded due to the reciprocating motion of the scraper. Another way is friction separation by which a card is separated from a card storage box by a friction between a rubber wheel and the card. In this manner, the rubber wheel is fixed at an up and down position, thus in the case that multiple cards are stacked and inclined, a gap may be generated between the rubber wheel and the uppermost card, therefore, it is difficult to ensure sufficient contact between the rubber wheel and the card and a success rate of card dispensing as well.